BRIEF REPORT
Memento for interprofessional learning
Patricia J. T. A. Groenen1 &A. W. Langerak2 &F. Fend3 &J. H. J. M. van Krieken1
Received: 3 March 2020 / Revised: 3 March 2020 / Accepted: 19 March 2020 # The Author(s) 2020
Abstract
The vast increase of technical, diagnostic, and treatment possibilities and deepened understanding of molecular biology has revolutionized diagnosis and treatment of cancer and thus has great impact on pathology. Different professionals are responsible for proper evaluation of the results and their translating into an accurate diagnosis and appropriate treatment. Next to expertise, a close interaction between clinical molecular biologists, pathologists, and oncologists is required; it is crucial that these profes-sionals speak“the same language.” Key to this is communication skills and creating possibilities for collaboration in a mean-ingful context. Here, we present an interprofessional, educational workshop model and we describe the parameters that contribute to effective learning by specialists.
Keywords Molecular diagnostics . Pathology . Oncology . Learning . Interprofessional
A modern pathology laboratory has practicing patholo-gists and clinical molecular biolopatholo-gists each with their own expertise, role, and responsibility. Exchange of rel-evant information across both professionals is essential to properly apply and integrate test results for state-of-the-art pathology reporting. Here, we stress the impor-tance of interprofessional learning.
Implementation of complex tests and understanding the impact and potential is a difficult process. Clonality anal-ysis of antigen receptor gene rearrangements in lymphoma is such a complex test, which has gained wide acceptance through well-cited publications, but causes problems in routine practice. It was decided to set up an educational workshop to promote the correct use of clonality analysis so that patients are not over- or under-treated. Because it turned out that the integration of knowledge from differ-ent disciplines (histopathology and molecular biology)
was the core problem, a cased-based, interprofessional workshop was chosen.
The annual workshop (http://www.euroclonality.org/ workshop/) is a real hands-on workshop; most of the time is taken for case discussions. Participants are only accepted when they come as a team representing different disciplines from one center: a pathologist and a molecular biologist. Each team has to bring at least one illustrative case that created problems and present the pathological findings, clinical con-text, and the molecular data. This guarantees a minimum level of experience of the participants and sufficient knowledge to be actively involved in the discussions. There are also educa-tional lectures given by the faculty, that is from various disci-plines as well.
To evaluate the learning process, a questionnaire form is filled out by the participants. This revealed important param-eters for effective learning:
1. A safe environment: the workshop takes place in a small group. The small group, the easily accessible faculty, and the shared meals (lunches and dinners) provide a safe learning environment, which is an important parameter for effective adult learning [1,2].
2. Interprofessional approach: the pathologist and the molec-ular biologist learn together. There is exchange of relevant information, from both sides. The professionals feel their perspective valued. This approach entails translation be-tween the different “professions”, thereby learning “to speak the same language” [3].
* Patricia J. T. A. Groenen Patricia.Groenen@radboudumc.nl
1
Dept. of Pathology, Radboud University Medical Centre Nijmegen, Geert Grooteplein Zuid 10, P.O Box 9101, 6500
HB Nijmegen, The Netherlands
2
Department of Immunology, Laboratory for Medical Immunology, Erasmus MC, University Medical Center, 3015
CN Rotterdam, The Netherlands
3 Institute of Pathology and Neuropathology, University Hospital
Tuebingen/Eberhard-Karls-University, 72076 Tuebingen, Germany Virchows Archiv
3. A meaningful context: the workshop is focused on discus-sion of own cases, which is a powerful enhancer of learn-ing [4]. Similar cases might have been seen by other par-ticipants in their practice and are therefore educational for the entire group.
4. Immediate feedback is given by the faculty at multiple levels: (a) about the results and interpretation, (b) address-ing deeper learnaddress-ing coveraddress-ing new applications or under-standing of the pathobiology, (c) addressing the way the participants will regulate their continuous learning pro-cess. Providing feedback contributes greatly to the learn-ing process [5].
In oncology diagnostics, there are many fascinating novel developments. Medical professionals should main-tain lifelong learning skills and drive their own educa-tional process to develop new competencies. Our work-shop has been organized for more than 10 years, is very well appreciated, and has been effective to build new competences. Our experience may assist other orga-nizers in developing similar training programs.
Acknowledgments We are grateful to the head of the Department of Pathology, Radboudumc, for the possibility to host the EuroClonality Educational Workshop in Nijmegen and to the workshop secretariat for their assistance. We thank the participants for their open discussions. Authors’ contributions PJTA Groenen is the founder of the EuroClonality Educational Workshop, Workshop faculty; clinical molec-ular biologist (in pathology); 2006–now and chair of the EuroClonality Foundation.
AW Langerak: Workshop faculty; molecular medical immunologist; 2006–now and treasurer of the EuroClonailty Foundation.
F Fend: Workshop faculty; hematopathologist; 2017–now and partic-ipant of the EuroClonality Foundation.
JHJM van Krieken: Workshop faculty, hematopathologist; 2006–2016 and participant of the EuroClonality Foundation until 2017.
PJTA Groenen: idea for the manuscript, wrote the first manuscript, performed literature search and processed comments and prepared the final manuscript. AW Langerak, F Fend, and JHJM van Krieken carefully read the manuscript and commented on the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
Funding information The EuroClonality Educational Workshops are funded by the EuroClonality Foundation.
Compliance with ethical standards
Conflict of interest EuroClonality is a scientific foundation that together with the foundations EuroMRD and EuroFlow, is connected to the ESLHO foundation/EHA scientific working group. The objectives of the EuroClonality Foundation are aimed at innovation, standardization, and education in the field of diagnostic clonality analysis. The revenues of the previously obtained patent (PCT/NL2003/000690), which is collec-tively owned by the EuroClonality Foundation and licensed to Invivoscribe, are exclusively used for EuroClonality activities, such as for covering costs of the Working Group meetings, collective WorkPackages, and the EuroClonality Educational Workshops. Informed consent Because fully anonymized data were shown and discussed during the workshops, no informed consent was obtained. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adap-tation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, pro-vide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visithttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
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